


Caught

by Tarlan



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Community: fanfic100, Community: mcsheplets, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-11
Updated: 2010-10-11
Packaged: 2017-10-21 04:07:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/220730
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tarlan/pseuds/Tarlan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An interlude with Torren...and John.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Caught

**Author's Note:**

> For... **Fanfic100** #29. Birth and **McSheplets** #62 Borrowed

"I caught him!"

"Yeah. You did. You did good, Rodney." John shook his head in exasperated fondness but Rodney refused to let it spoil the moment.

With all that he had achieved here on Atlantis before and since Torren's birth--pushing back the frontiers of science--that one small moment still filled him with awe. The miracle of new life. The newborn pushed from his mother's womb into Rodney's waiting hands. It had been a dichotomy of disgusting and beautiful, of fear and joy. Ten fingers, ten toes, and he'd checked: it was a boy. He had wrapped the tiny bundle in his warm jacket and handed the baby to his mother, and Teyla had never seemed more beautiful to him in that moment despite the exhaustion on her face and the gore of birth in a less than ideal location.

Getting off Michael's ship had almost ruined the joyful reunion and birth, but all Rodney had to do to get that feeling back was turn his head and look at Teyla and the tiny baby cradled in her arms.

Now, Torren was a bundle of energy whizzing around the main room of the quarters Rodney shared with John while Teyla made the last of her preparations for celebrating Torren's second birthday on the following day. The child's laughter was infectious; his dark eyes sparkling like Kanaan's and his smile as bright as Teyla's. Of course, the excitement was fueled by a certain USAF Colonel who was chasing him around while pretending to be a lurching monster. Eventually John caught the boy and lifted him up high before pretending he was an airplane. If Torren ended up wanting to be pilot when he grew up then Rodney was totally blaming John, but that was still better than ending up a soft scientist like Jackson.

Eventually, John flopped onto the couch beside Rodney, letting the squirming child wriggle off his lap and onto Rodney's where he snuggled in.

"Story!"

At least Torren recognized Rodney's superior story telling skills but then, Rodney had attended several drama classes while working on his first doctorate. Not that it had impressed the lovely Katherine Jaeger, earning him his first slap round the face that was actually scripted, though she could have remembered that they were only acting and not hit him quite so hard. Love taps aside, at least John had never hit him. Shot him, yes, but deliberately punched or slapped him, no.

In hindsight, Rodney wondered if he should have paid more attention to handsome, dark-haired men in his youth rather than focus on beautiful, blond women. Blonds had only ever brought him pain and humiliation...and exile to Siberia. Even his most promising relationship with Jennifer had ended in tears--his. Once she realized there was only so far he could change outside of having another parasite stuck in his brain, they had argued and he had said some things in the heat of the moment that he had regretted instantly. She had said some things too, about him caring more for John than for her, and he owed her a debt of gratitude now because the words may have sounded a little callous at the time but they had opened his eyes.

He and Jennifer were good friends now, and he was glad he had managed to persuade her to stay with Atlantis when the city returned to Pegasus.

John was a different problem. As an international expedition, the Atlantis military had adhered to multi-national regulations from the start. Most countries forming part of the IOA had no regulations against gays serving in their military, therefore DADT was never a concern. However, fraternization was an issue that John took seriously. Officially, he and John held equal ranking while on Atlantis so it could have easily been overlooked by O'Neill, but when working as an off-world team, John was in charge--officially. The solution had been simple enough. Balancing off-world duties with his work as Chief Scientist had become increasingly difficult since the return to Pegasus with a full complement of scientists working in numerous fields of expertise--plus Radek had threatened to quit if Rodney dumped any more administration work on him.

Rodney stepped down from the team.

Any time he started to regret the decision, he would tag along on an off-world trade agreement or request a mission to explore one of the many places they had put aside due to more pressing issues. Not so strangely, that feeling of nostalgia soon evaporated.

With no regulations left to prevent them from getting together, Rodney had started a new personal project--Project Get Sheppard--only to see all his hard work go to waste on the very day that he had planned to present the facts to John. He remembered that day so clearly...

***

**Eight Months Earlier**

Rodney blinked in shock, reaching up to touch his still tingling lips. John had retreated to the far side of the room and was looking at him with a stoic yet pained expression that was too reminiscent of all those times when John had planned something that any sane person would consider suicidal.

"You...You can't do that."

John winced, and turned to leave.

"I have a picnic basket," Rodney blurted out.

John froze in place for a moment before turning back, looking confused.

"A picnic basket," he deadpanned.

Rodney stabbed a finger towards him. "Yes! I borrowed it from that...that marine that likes to cook."

"Sergeant Grady? The cook?"

"It has beer...and sandwiches. Turkey sandwiches."

"O...kay."

"No, no, no. Not okay. I made lists. I had a presentation cataloging every incident that proved we would be good together." He waved a hand. "Obviously, I glossed over the not so stellar moments in our relationship but..." Rodney deflated. "We arranged to meet up for a drink on the nice and secluded east pier and I was going to..."

John had moved slowly back across the room, eyes now holding a hope-filled expression.

"You were going to...?"

"I was going to kiss you first," Rodney finished, crossing his arms both defensively and in annoyance.

John seemed taken aback by his words, eyebrows crawling into his hairline, but then he smirked, eyes dancing with what Rodney hoped was pleasure rather than glee. John tipped his head to one side. "You still can."

"What? How does that make any sense?"

"I kissed you...but you haven't kissed me back...yet."

"And how exactly does that make it--?"

The second kiss left his lips tingling anew.

"You kissed me again!"

"Yeah," John breathed softly, "And I'm still waiting on you to kiss me back."

They never made it out to the east pier, eventually spreading the contents of the basket across a sex-rumpled bed.

***

**The Present**

Torren was a warm, heavy weight in his arms but instead of allowing John to take the sleeping child, Rodney held on for a moment longer, brushing his fingers through the baby-soft hair.

"I caught him," he whispered, recalling that day on Michael's ship.

John sank down beside him on the couch, mirroring Rodney by brushing his fingers through Rodney's hair before cupping his cheek and turning his head until they faced each other.

"Yeah, you caught us both," John ghosted against his lips before sealing his words with a kiss.

END


End file.
